“A generalized definition of slope then is the number of feet of fall or rise in a horizontal distance or S = DE/L, where S is the slope and DE is the difference in elevation between the end points of a line of which the horizontal or map distance is L (Fig. 2.9).”

“Who is truly happy and content in this world?”
— Mesillat Yesharim, or Paths of the Just by Moshe Luzzato, a classic of early mussar literature by an eminent kabbalist.

Unfortunately this is a short sentence in a paragraph of short sentences, in a book where most of the sentences are longer and more interesting, with many subordinate clauses. But fortunately this page is in English – the even-number pages are the original Hebrew.

“This is a disorder characterized by physical tics aand twitches that may involve any part of the body, as well as vocal symptoms such as grunts and barks, echolalia (involuntary repitition of the words of others), and coprolalia (compulsive repetition of obscene words).” Keith Stanovich, How to Think Straight about Psychology, 7th edition.

“During the whole of the nineteenth century and the first years of the twentieth, a great many enlightened and progressive thinkers had supposed that a main danger, perhaps the principal danger, to modern civilization came from a single political tendency, which was the extreme right, and mostly from a single country, which was Germany, the sworn foe of the French Revolution.” Paul Berman – Terror and Liberalism

Actually, there were a couple of books that were closer, but because they were on a lower shelf they didn’t catch my eye: The Bible (KJ version) and Public Finance and Public Choice, by James Buchanan and Richard Musgrave.

” When I looked up through the web of trees, the night fell over me, and for a moment I lost my boundaries, feeling like the sky was my own skin, and the moon was my heart beating up there in the dark.”